(Reuters) -An overnight missile attack damaged an industrial facility and numerous cars in the southwestern Russian port of Taganrog, the acting governor of the Rostov region said on Wednesday.
“According to preliminary information, no one was hurt,” the acting governor, Yuri Slyusar, said on the Telegram messaging app.
Slyusar said 14 cars had caught fire, but he did not disclose details on what else was hit or how big the attack was.
Reuters was not able to independently verify the reports. There was no immediate comment from Ukraine.
After 1,000 days of the war in Ukraine, which Russia started with full-scale invasion in 2022, Kyiv used for the first time U.S. ATACMS missiles in November to strike into Russia, taking advantage of newly granted permission from the administration of outgoing U.S. President Joe Biden.
Days later, Russia fired a hypersonic intermediate-range ballistic missile at the Ukrainian city of Dnipro.
Since then, Russia reported it had shot down at least 15 ATACMS missiles. President Vladimir Putin said Kyiv’s use of Western-made missiles meant the “direct involvement” of the West in an armed conflict with Russia.
The damaged area of Taganrog, a city of about a quarter of a million people on Russia’s Black Sea coast and not far from the border with Ukraine, has been cordoned off by police, Svetlana Kambulova, the head of the city, said on Telegram.
The attack partially damaged a boiler building, cutting off heat to 27 apartment buildings, Kambulova said.
A series of explosions could be heard in the dark in videos posted on unofficial Russian Telegram channels but it was not clear where they were coming from.
Russia has an air base near the city, from which military analysts say Russia’s air force operates drones, bombers and other weapons to attack Ukraine.
Separately, Russia’s defence ministry said its air defence units destroyed 14 Ukrainian drones overnight over the Bryansk region that borders Ukraine.
Bryansk Governor Alexander Bogomaz said on his Telegram channel that a “production facility” caught a short-lived fire as result of the attack. He did not say what facility was damaged.
Citing local Bryansk officials, unofficial Russian Telegram news channels reported an oil refinery in Bryansk caught fire. Reuters could not independently verify the reports.
(Reporting by Lidia Kelly in Melbourne; Editing by Himani Sarkar and Lincoln Feast.)
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